Bucket List #68 - Hike to Delicate Arch = Complete

Last weekend, Heather, Haley, and I went down to southern Utah to run in the Winter Sun 10K race. We decided to make a weekend of it and see some other sites while we were down there. On Thursday night, we drove down to Monticello and stayed in a hotel. Then we did an endowment session at the Monticello Temple the next morning. I love small temples! The workers are so excited that you're there! It was windy and freezing!

After the temple, we grabbed some lunch, changed, and headed to Canyonlands National Park. All of the following pictures are from Canyonlands and they can be summed up by saying, "Fun with rocks."

Jumping in the air pictures!!

After Canyonlands, we headed up to Moab, picked up our race packets, checked into our hotel, and headed to dinner. This where I tell the story of the only bad thing that happened on the trip. I decided to be bad and get a hamburger and french fries at dinner. When I say "bad", I mean full out BAD...bacon, pepper jack cheese, avocado, green chiles, and jalapenos. It sounded way too good to pass up, so I cut it in half and only ate half of it. That makes it ok, right? :) It was heavenly delicious. Then we backed dinner up with some ice cream.

My body went on immediate strike. I had the worst heartburn a person could imagine. Haley went next door to the pharmacy and bought me some Tums. I downed like six of them. Nothing. Then I felt like I was going to barf, so I went to the bathroom. Nothing. So I thought I'd take a hot bath. That always makes you feel better when you're sick, right? Wrong. When I got out of the bath, my delicious dinner was inside me no more. Haley left again to buy me some Sprite. I felt a little better, but still not quite right. Then of course, I had to barf again when Haley was in the shower and the toilet was unavailable. This equals me barfing in the sink. I went to bed thinking there is no possible way that I can run a race in the morning. Miracles happen though because I woke up feeling as good as new. After telling Kara this story, she is 100% that I had a gall bladder attack. Let's just pray it was my body rebelling against all the greasy fatty food and not that I have gall stones!

The next morning we were off to the race. The race went awesome! I had zero plans of trying to jog the whole thing, but I felt so dang good the whole time that I just kept on running (said like Forrest Gump). I finished in 1hr and 4min. So dang impressed with myself! Heather finished with her personal best time, and Haley finished even with a chest cold. Don't know how she did that! Here we are after the race.

After some lunch and a change of clothes, we were off to Arches National Park to hike to Delicate Arch. This is where my bucket list #68 comes in. Check that one off the list. It is sort of amazing! Why does this exist? I don't know, but I sure loved hiking to it!

What do you do at Delicate Arch you ask? Do a handstand against it...duh!

Blue sky, blue tongue (thank you blue raspberry Jolly Rancher), and blue eyes. Fun, fun, fun!

Little me under the arch.

We made a quick stop at Balanced Rock on the way out.

And took some more jumping in the air pictures. So funny!

Thanks for the great trip Haley and Heather! Couldn't have asked for better company and a more awesome time!